Blackout
| Series = Major Crimes | Season = 4 | Episode = 12 | Airdate = November 9, 2015 | Viewers = million | Writer = Damiani Johnson | Director = David McWhirter | Guests = | Previous = | Next = | Episode list = Season 4}} Jack Raydor is back again, defending a man who is attempting to withdraw a confession in the murder of his wife. A last-second video purporting to provide the defendant with an alibi alerts the Major Crimes team to the possibility of a conspiracy. Rusty interviews Slider, while Flynn is still living with Sharon due to his injury. The Victim *Lisa Song **Wife of Ken Song. **Pushed over a railing and suffered a head injury that she bled out from. **Killed by her own mother when she wouldn't leave Ken. *Ken Song **Husband of Lisa Song. **Framed for murdering his wife by Beverly Lowe. The Suspects *Ken Song **Victim's husband. **Was abusive towards her and their daughter Mia. **Confessed to Lisa's murder. **Was having an affair with Lisa's sister Mary. **Was in a bar at the time of Lisa's murder and was framed. *Mary Lowe **Lisa's sister. **Had an affair with Ken **Was making out with him in a bar shortly before the murder. **Intended to tell her sister about the affair but chickened out. *Beverly Lowe **Mother of Lisa Song. **Killed her daughter to get Lisa away from Ken Song. **Framed Ken Song for the murder. Evidence Closing the Case After locating the bar the video was shot in, Sykes questions the bartender. While the man doesn't remember Ken Song specifically, he knows the girls in the background of the video are UCLA grad students and that a drink shown on the video as well means it was someone's birthday party. Tao contacts the registrar's office to find out whose birthday fell on that date while DDA Hobbs realizes that she may be prosecuting the wrong man for Lisa Song's murder. However, its suggested that Ken Song set up the video as an alibi while someone else committed the murder for him. With the video not being brought to light until trial when jeopardy was attached, Ken can never be tried for Lisa's murder if the video gets him acquitted. Sharon wonders why Ken confessed to the crime to begin with it that was really his plan all along. Going through photo IDs of all UCLA girls who share a birthday with the murder, Tao is able to identify Ainsley Reed, a Master's degree candidate in psychology as the one whose birthday it was. Ainsley is brought in and explains that her friend Morgan had sent her the video the day after her birthday and when she returned to the bar a week later, someone was passing out flyers asking about Ken Song. Ken had been making out with someone before she left angrily and then started harassing one of Ainsley's friends. Shown a picture of Lisa Song, Ainsley states that it wasn't Lisa that Ken had been making out with, it was someone who was more brunette than blonde. Ainsley also sent the video to the email address on the flyer as soon as she got it, around the end of January, beginning of February. Tao takes Ainsley to write down her statement while Hobbs wonders why Jack held back the video after having had it for months. Hobbs suggests that its because Ken was having an affair, but Sharon thinks its because Jack wants a reward "$250,000 a month to be exact." Sharon and Hobbs realize that what Jack is up to is not only getting his client off on a murder charge, but preparing to sue the LAPD and the city for wrongful imprisonment. Sharon, Hobbs and Assistant Chief Russell Taylor confront Jack with the evidence that he sat on the video for months. Jack claims that when the video was emailed in to his top investigator, it came from what seemed to be a spam email account and had an improper subject line. As a result, it sat in his investigator's junk mail box for months until Jack asked him to go through all of his emails and he discovered it. Jack admits that he had seen the video two weeks before and they confront him on how because he wanted to make money through a civil suit, an innocent man sat in jail for months when he could've been released. They also bring up Ken Song's affair, but Jack just challenges them to introduce it so that he can get it excluded as prejudicial. As he departs, Jack smugly tells the three that they wouldn't be there if the police had originally done their job. Hobbs reluctantly admits that Jack's explanation of the evidence works legally and even if it didn't, the video is still admissible. "If Ken Song didn't murder his wife, who did?" asks Sharon. Sykes approaches Sharon with a new development: while looking through the bar receipts from the night of the murder, she found one signed at 7:05pm by Mary Lowe, the sister of Lisa Song. Ainsley Reed also identified Mary in a lineup of pictures as the one who had been making out with Ken Song at the bar. Sharon and Sykes realize that if Mary left after signing the receipt, she could've been the one to drive to Ken and Lisa's house and kill her sister with the motive that she was in love with Ken. Hobbs and Julio confront Mary over her lying about her whereabouts on the night of the murder. Mary tells them that that night, Ken and Lisa had had a terrible fight and he called her, afraid that Lisa would leave him and take the baby with her which Mary states Lisa would've never done. Julio brings up the fact that Mary and Ken were having an affair, stunning Mary. Hobbs then departs as Mary is now a suspect rather than a witness and is replaced by Provenza. Provenza asks Mary if she now recalls making out with Ken Song in a bar half an hour before her sister was murdered. Mary lies about the kiss, but Provenza tells Mary that they have a witness. Together Julio and Provenza press Mary about the affair, accusing her of colluding with Ken to murder Lisa or to have killed Lisa on her own to steal her sister's husband with Ken confessing to protect her. Mary asks for a lawyer with Sharon agreeing that she probably does need one. However, Hobbs warns that if they are going to prove a conspiracy between Mary and Ken they have a very limited amount of time to do it in. The next day, Mary's lawyer tells Julio and Tao that she won't take questions about the affair which he claims lasted less than a year and Mary had been planning on ending despite making out with Ken in the bar. The lawyer points out that even in the video, Ken was flirting with other women and uses it as proof that the affair between Mary and Ken wasn't love. Julio questions if Mary went to her sister's house on the night of the murder and she admits that she did to tell Lisa about the affair. Mary claims that she wanted Lisa to leave Ken, but not so that she could have him. She arrived before 7:30 which is when Ken and Lisa were supposed to leave for their reservation, believing that Ken was right behind her. However, Mary claims to have never entered the house, chickening out after hearing the baby wailing inside. As Mary explains how she couldn't face Lisa and tell her sister what she had done, Sharon is suddenly hit by a realization and looks through a file as Taylor enters to warn them that they only have fifteen minutes until they have to be in court. Provenza points out that Ken has an airtight alibi with the video and if he and Mary had been conspiring together, they won't prove it in the time they have. Sharon tells them that Mary may not have been present at the crime, but she now knows that the baby was which she states explains the heel mark on Lisa's blouse. Taking Sykes with her, Sharon departs the electronics room. "What, the baby did it?" a confused Taylor asks. "Well its new. Its never the baby," jokes Provenza. In court, Hobbs admits that they can't disprove the video and now believe that it exonerates Ken Song. As a result, Hobbs requests that the indictment be dismissed with the stipulation that Ken be remanded to the LAPD rather than the sheriff's department for faster processing. Though Jack tries to protest, Judge Grove overrules him with threats that if Jack continues, he will order an investigation into why the video took so long to surface. Ken Song is exonerated of the murder of Lisa Song to the horror of Lisa's mother, Beverly Lowe. As Ken thanks Jack, he shows no knowledge of the video that exonerated him and Jack promises to explain later. As Beverly moves to leave, she is intercepted by Sharon and Sykes. Sharon tells Beverly that they need her help as they are very close to arresting the person responsible for Lisa's murder. In an interrogation room, Sykes reads Beverly her rights which Sharon claims is merely a formality so that they don't get in trouble in court again. Sykes informs Beverly about Mary being in the bar with Ken and Ken and Mary's affair. Beverly is noticeably unsurprised and admits to knowing about the affair, but not about the bar. "There wasn't one horrible thing that Ken Song didn't do to my family," Beverly comments. Sharon and Sykes bring up the fact that in Beverly's original statement, she claimed that Lisa had dropped her granddaughter Mia off to Beverly at 6:30pm and Beverly had been babysitting her granddaughter. After Beverly confirms it, the detectives inform her about Mary's statement that she heard the baby crying inside of Lisa's house at 7:30pm, after the time that Beverly claims that Mia was at her house. They produce Mary's bar receipt as proof after Beverly claims that Mary was confused. They also bring up the fact that Beverly was supposed to pick up the baby before he and Lisa left for dinner at 7:30, making it two people claiming the baby was supposed to be home at that time. As Sykes continues to press her, Beverly finally admits that she did go to Lisa's house after her fight with Ken and found out that Ken had slapped both Lisa and Mia and had slapped the baby for crying. Beverly states that she wanted to get her daughter away from a violent drunk who was tearing their family apart and that the baby needed protecting. However, despite all the things that Beverly had discovered that Ken had done, Lisa refused to leave him. Beverly went upstairs and packed a suitcase and grabbed the baby too. As a result of her hands being full, Beverly couldn't push Lisa out of the way. Instead, she kicked her out of the way, leaving the heel mark on Lisa's blouse. The blow flipped Lisa over the railing. Sykes and Sharon question if the result was an accident and that Beverly didn't intend to kill Lisa. Beverly insists that it was an accident, that she hadn't intended to kill Lisa as she loved her daughter. However, Sharon and Sykes point out that Lisa was still alive after the fall and Beverly left the house with Lisa lying on the floor, bleeding and unconscious. As a result, Lisa's death seems more deliberate than accidental. Sharon and Sykes point out that Lisa was alive for three hours after the fall before dying and Beverly never called for help. Beverly tells them that they don't know how Ken ruined her family and she needed Ken out of their lives. "So your hatred for Ken was stronger than your love for your daughter, is that it?" questions Sharon. Beverly insists that Lisa had to leave Ken "one way or another" while a watching Hobbs states that Beverly's statement makes it "a neat jump from manslaughter to murder two." Hobbs decides to see if she can get Mary's lawyer to help convince Beverly that she "doesn't have much luck in courtrooms" and to take a deal. Beverly continually insists that she is the only one that can save her granddaughter. Before releasing Ken Song, the detectives inform him of how Jack let Ken think for months that he was guilty and withheld the evidence that would've exonerated Ken. In the middle of the murder room, Ken angrily fires Jack and promises that once he gets a new attorney, Jack will be one of those Ken is filing a civil suit against. Guest Cast Recurring *Ron Marasco (Judge Steven Grove) *Garrett Coffey (Slider) Locations Episode Notes The Other Side of the Coin *Rusty meets with Slider for an interview, but Slider informs him that his lawyer never told him about the meeting and feels that Rusty screwed him over like he feels the system did. Rusty knows he's Slider's only visitor besides his lawyer and brings up how his mother was an addict with "a great disappearing act" and she told him that while she was in jail, anything that broke her routine was worthwhile. Slider only wants to talk about Alice as he's insistent on being innocent until proven guilty, but Rusty is not allowed to talk with him about the cease. *Rusty doesn't get anywhere with Slider and wonders if he should bother to keep trying, but after hearing the story, Andy suggests that Slider may not be wrong as the system doesn't always do right by everybody. Andy suggests that if Rusty does go see Slider again, he show him the questions on paper to see if he's ever actually seen them before or lied about that. Andy suggests that there might be more to it than Slider never seeing them before. *Rusty visits Slider again and shows him the questions as Andy suggested. Slider insists that he's never seen the questions before in his life and Rusty asks him just to answer the third question, "where do you reside" for him. When Slider refuses, he asks Slider to just read one of the questions aloud to him and when Slider can't read it, Rusty realizes that Slider doesn't know how to read. Andy's Health *Andy is still recovering from his injuries in "Four of a Kind". Andy reveals to Sharon that as a result of complications from his fall the week before, he has developed a blood clot that is now in his carotid artery. Andy is on blood thinners in an effort to thin the clot and will require surgery if it doesn't work. Due to his continued need for supervised care, Andy continues to live with Sharon and Rusty while Patrice Perry looks after him when they are not home. Goofs *After Sykes kicks the dummy off the balcony, Doctor Morales states that she hit the mark exactly. In fact, its clear that the dummy's head landed slightly to the side of the mark taped to the floor. Trivia *While what ultimately happens to Beverly Lowe is not revealed in the episode, its stated in a deleted scene available on the season 4 DVD that she has taken a deal. What the deal is is not stated. Episode Media *Rusty goes over what he has learned of Slider's history. Category:MC Season 4 Category:Major Crimes Category:Episodes